0:15

Pushkin previously

0:23

on Deep Cover. It

0:26

was the spring of nineteen eighty five. Ned

0:29

Timmins had been working undercover with bikers

0:31

in the Detroit area for roughly

0:33

three years. He thought he was close

0:36

to finding something big to infiltrating

0:38

a smuggling ring. Supposedly

0:40

it was importing huge amounts of marijuana,

0:43

and now he had a lead on someone

0:45

who might be directly involved, a part

0:47

time car salesman who went by the nickname

0:50

Shine. We're

0:54

looking at what he has, a house and cars

0:56

and everything, and no source of income.

0:59

And then we're pulling phone records, bank records

1:02

and everything, and huge deposits

1:04

of fifty sixty thousand at a time.

1:07

Ned thought he might have enough to

1:10

try and flip Shine. The FBI

1:12

knows a lot, but a lot of it is a

1:14

game to try to ferret

1:17

out the information you need. When

1:20

you throw down the FBI badge and credentials,

1:23

it horrifies guilty people. What

1:28

Ned needed was an inn an introduction,

1:31

and as Ned recalls it, another

1:33

one of his biker informants came up

1:35

with the solution. They would all get

1:38

together and have a chili cookoff see

1:40

who could cook the meanest bowl of chili

1:42

concarnate, because apparently Shine

1:46

love to cook, so this would

1:48

be a sort of informal iron chef

1:50

competition. Ned says, this other

1:52

biker, his informant, set the whole

1:54

thing up. Basically, he tells

1:56

Shine, and I was at this guy's house

1:58

and he makes the most incredible chili and it's

2:00

better than nearest Shine. Well, Shines,

2:03

like bull fucking shit is better

2:05

than mine. We'll have a cookoff. This

2:09

is also exactly how it all goes

2:12

down in the novel Shine

2:15

and taking the chili challenge seriously. Ned

2:18

could smell the rich PEPPERI aromas

2:21

from out in a neatly trimmed front yard. Every

2:24

man has something he's proud of. The deck

2:26

he built, the way he cooks a steak,

2:29

how well tuned his carburetors are for

2:32

Shine, it was his chili.

2:35

In the novel, Ned describes Shine as

2:37

a jackal, a guy with bright,

2:40

intelligent eyes and a body that looked

2:42

ready to bite fast and hard. Ned

2:48

knocks on the door of Shine's house. So

2:51

we get

2:53

in there and bullshit around, and I

2:56

see that there in the kitchen is a

2:59

regular sized shotgun. Shotgun

3:01

above the door. Air

3:04

fifteen in one corner, guns all over the

3:06

place. At this point, Ned

3:08

says he's still very much in character, just

3:10

playing the role of Ed Thomas,

3:13

the badass biker who just stopped by

3:15

to cook some chili and down some bruskies.

3:18

He's just waiting for the right moment when

3:20

everyone is relaxed, guards

3:22

down. We go about an

3:24

hour and we're

3:26

sitting in a kitchen and

3:31

I said, well, it's time to make a move. I

3:34

just took my credits out of my pocket and

3:36

laid him on the table and said, Shine, I'm an FBI

3:38

agent. I'm going to send you away

3:40

for life. I'm gonna take this motherfucking

3:42

house. I'm gonna take your cars. I'm

3:45

gonna take any money you got in the bank. You're

3:47

not gonna have a fucking penny, and

3:50

you play ball with me or all this

3:52

has gone, all of it. Ned

3:56

says that it took Shine time to come around,

3:58

but eventually, after many hours

4:01

of hemmying and hauing, he agreed

4:03

to cooperate to switch sides

4:05

and start working for the FBI. But

4:08

not necessarily because Ned won him

4:10

over with his tough talk or his badge.

4:13

Shine I found out had his own

4:15

agenda, and that agenda had everything

4:17

to do with one crucial detail.

4:20

It was obvious if he just looked at

4:22

the guy. He'd been shot

4:24

in the right thigh and took

4:27

a probably eight inch circular

4:29

chunk of meat out of his leg and some of the bone,

4:31

and so was shorter. He had to wear a shoe

4:34

with a big lift, and so he limped

4:36

quite a bit. So

4:38

yeah, the jackal the wild

4:41

predatory dog. In real life,

4:43

he was partially disabled because

4:46

it turns out someone had almost

4:48

killed him. And when Ned showed

4:51

up, Shine was looking for an

4:53

escape.

5:01

I'm Jake Albern and this is

5:03

Deep Cover, episode

5:06

three, El Dorado.

5:37

Shine was hurt badly in the shooting.

5:39

He was in a coma intubated, just

5:42

lying there. Shine's son Adam,

5:45

who was fifteen at the time, still remembers

5:47

at all. Every day after school

5:49

was kind of a death watch because

5:51

he was in an ostra for a long time.

5:54

Mom, pick us up from school, just

5:56

it became routine, going

5:58

your homework, sit there for a couple hours, home,

6:02

how was your day? And that went

6:04

on for a long time. His father

6:07

eventually came too, but he was in the

6:09

hospital for three months before

6:11

he finally was ready to go home, well,

6:14

not home exactly. As

6:16

Shine gets ready to leave the hospital, he

6:18

decides they can't go back to melvin

6:20

Dale, the working class factory town

6:23

where they lived, and as Adam

6:25

remembers it, Dad had come up

6:27

with a bold new plan. We

6:30

were better off getting out of there. That

6:33

was the way it was presented to us kids,

6:35

like, hey, it's you know. We know

6:37

you're leaving all your friends that you've known forever,

6:40

but we need to get out of here. So

6:43

they decided to relocate. They found

6:45

a place where the family could lay low escape

6:47

the trouble that was brewing in Detroit. They

6:50

moved to Clarkston, a rural hamlet

6:52

surrounded by lakes, about forty

6:54

miles north of Detroit. It

6:57

would be great if we could ask Shine how

6:59

he remembers all of this going down, But

7:02

remember he's deceased. He got cancer

7:04

in the nineties and passed away, so

7:07

we can't ask him. But we did get

7:09

our hands on about six hundred pages of

7:11

court testimony, all Shine

7:13

under oath, telling his side of the

7:15

story, and the story that emerges,

7:18

well, it's not entirely consistent

7:20

with Ned's version of events.

7:23

Shine says he was actually looking

7:25

for Ned, that he had heard about an agent

7:27

he could trust from Toby Anderson, the

7:30

violent country western singer. Remember

7:32

that Shine's older brother, and

7:35

he vouches for Ned. In

7:37

his testimony, Shine says he was

7:39

looking for Ned because he was scared,

7:41

scared of his bosses. He suspected

7:44

it was one of them who had him shot. Shine

7:47

says in the court records, it seemed

7:49

to me like the group was out of control.

7:52

They were smuggling cocaine more and more

7:54

frequently, and I was afraid I was going

7:56

to get shot again. That's the reason

7:58

I went to Ned Timmins, not because of

8:00

fear of going to jail. Slowly,

8:04

Shine started to tell Ned about the group,

8:06

as he called it, the smugglers, and

8:09

said it was a large operation involving

8:11

countless people across many states,

8:13

and he was in charge of security. His

8:16

job was to use that mysterious briefcase

8:18

with the voice stress analyzer, his

8:21

portable lie detector to vet every

8:23

single would be employee. If this

8:25

were true, Shine was the lynch pin,

8:28

the one guy who knew everyone.

8:31

There was just one problem. Shine

8:33

hated being an informant. He

8:36

didn't films good about it.

8:39

You know it was it wasn't type of person

8:41

that he was, but knew it was what he had

8:43

to do to

8:46

stay alize the Styckliss

8:48

family. I

8:51

was aware of the stress he was going through.

8:54

I was aware of how much it hurt

8:56

him. These were his friends. These

8:58

are the guys that he went to Texas and fish Bass

9:01

with. These are the guys he traveled with,

9:03

and you know, they were like a team.

9:05

He's trading them in and he's getting you. Yes,

9:10

here his new best friend. That's

9:13

what you had to do. You had to get whatever

9:15

information you could out of him. And during

9:17

this time with Shine, do

9:20

you think that he considers you his friend?

9:24

Yeah? I think so. On

9:26

one hand, he was a total,

9:29

crazy, drunken drug addict wild

9:31

man. On the other hand, he always

9:33

wanted to protect his family. Something happens

9:35

to me, You got to take care of my family. And

9:37

did you take that seriously? Yeah.

9:42

One of the things that Ned was most curious

9:45

about was a rumor that somewhere

9:47

in Detroit there was a massive warehouse

9:49

that smugglers were using to distribute

9:51

their drugs. The place sounded

9:54

mythic, the El Dorado of stash

9:56

houses, and Shine basically tells

9:58

Ned, Yep, that warehouse, it's

10:01

ours. Yeah.

10:03

Shine discussed the warehouse with me

10:05

and he said, here, I'll show you in. We

10:08

went and identified it. Shine was

10:10

quickly proving his worth. He knew

10:12

all about this warehouse because the guy

10:14

who ran it was his boss. You

10:17

Shine tells me about this guy,

10:19

Mike Vogel. You know. Shines

10:22

said that Vogel was controlling most

10:24

of the weed going into university in Michigan. Now

10:27

Nen had a direct lead on him, and he

10:29

put him under surveillance. After

10:32

the break, I tracked down Mike Vogel,

10:35

the mastermind behind Detroit's legendary

10:37

drug warehouse. Think

10:40

about how would you feel if

10:44

you could buy anything he wanted to? There

10:46

are no rules for the wealthy, and

10:48

none just all gets stupid. I

10:58

meet Mike Vogel at a house in a quaint

11:00

town outside of Detroit. Mike

11:03

greets me at the door. He's an older guy

11:05

and moves slowly, almost seems

11:08

like he has a limp, but not meek,

11:10

not at all, more like an

11:13

old bear. Not as fast as he used

11:15

to be, but hey, don't mess with him.

11:18

Grabs a cup of coffee, lights

11:20

a cigarette and just starts

11:22

talking, but before we get

11:24

into his life as a criminal mastermind,

11:27

he tells me that I have to understand where

11:29

he started out, not with

11:31

marijuana, but with groceries.

11:35

You gotta remember, way before all this, I work

11:37

for my father, Okay, And I

11:40

ran the frozen

11:43

food and receiving

11:45

docs for his company.

11:48

Okay, And that's when

11:50

I learned about wholesale distribution.

11:53

Yeah, prior to being a big time

11:55

drug distributor, he was moving large

11:57

quantities of frozen peas.

12:00

And my father's warehouse was like

12:03

two and a half city blocks long,

12:07

full of drags, full of can

12:10

goods, and a freezer that

12:12

was fifty thousand square feet. He

12:16

was a grocery guy. That's

12:19

how he became an expert in inventory,

12:21

specifically his father's tracking system.

12:24

They used paper receipts with carving

12:26

copies, you know, almost like what you'd get

12:28

at the dry cleaners. Mike grows

12:30

up in the grocery business, one of ten

12:32

kids, goes to Catholic school. He

12:35

says he was a reasonably good student in

12:38

college. Mike likes to party and hang out

12:40

with girls, smoke some pot. At

12:42

heart, though he's a business guy, he

12:45

doesn't want to get caught, and he wants to protect

12:47

himself by learning more about who might be

12:49

up against, so he decides

12:51

to do some homework. He starts volunteering

12:54

for the police. My

12:58

job was to watch to parking lots, quote

13:00

unquote. I want to know the codes. I

13:03

wanted to see how they were, how they acted.

13:06

And police are not They're

13:09

not as smart as everybody thinks. You know, They're

13:12

just doing their job. This whole

13:14

experience only builds Mike's confidence,

13:17

makes him think he can up his game start

13:20

dealing on a larger scale. Pretty

13:22

soon, he's buying five hundred pounds of marijuana

13:25

down to Florida, loading it into the trunk

13:27

of his Pontiac Bonneville, and driving

13:29

it up to Michigan, where he sells it to smaller

13:31

dealers. I knew him from

13:34

high school, all Catholic

13:36

Central buddies, and he just

13:38

keeps on expanding. I

13:40

knew how to build. You have

13:42

to have the product before you can do it. So

13:44

what you have to do is have a constant supply.

13:47

And that's what I had. There was a constant

13:49

supply. Like

13:52

any smart businessman, he had multiple

13:54

suppliers. Eventually big

13:56

suppliers. Some would bring the marijuana

13:58

in by plane to a small airport in northern

14:01

Michigan or a grass strip down in Kentucky.

14:04

Others brought it in by boat to secret

14:06

landing sites down south and then brought it up

14:08

north by truck. Then Mike

14:10

Loogal needed somewhere to put it. He

14:13

would store the product in the big warehouse out

14:15

an eight mile Mike the

14:17

grocery guy. He understood that

14:19

when it came to selling produce, whether it

14:22

was marijuana or you know, Brussels

14:24

sprouts, the key to profits was

14:26

moving large quantities quickly

14:29

and efficiently. Last,

14:31

but not least, he developed a network of

14:33

trusted buyers who each had their own

14:35

territory, for instance, college

14:38

campuses like University of Michigan,

14:40

and almost like a big retail chain. He

14:42

used his muscle to push out competitors.

14:46

I had it in such a way that I really

14:48

control the marijuana industry in Michigan

14:50

and Iver and all the rest. I'd hear of someone

14:53

else bring in a loud, I'd just bring

14:55

in stuff and reduced my prices so

14:57

they could. One guy I heard he was selling

14:59

his stuff for three tan. I start

15:01

saw mine at two eighty five, and

15:04

I always had good product. All

15:08

of this sounds like stuff out of a classic

15:10

business school textbook. Right sell

15:13

large quantities, so even slim profit

15:15

margins can pay off. Keep your inventory

15:17

moving. If competitors emerge,

15:20

undersell them. Even if you lose some money,

15:22

it's worth it to maintain control of the market.

15:25

I mean, this guy could be your classic

15:27

Midwestern CEO, which

15:29

he kind of was. But all

15:31

of this has to be done in complete

15:34

secrecy. For example, most

15:36

buyers didn't even know where his big warehouse

15:38

was. When they came to make a pickup, he'd

15:41

have them go to a rendezvous point like some

15:43

truck stop. Then one of Mike's

15:45

trusted drivers would take the buyer's

15:48

vehicle to the warehouse, loaded

15:50

up with pot, and then head back to the truck

15:52

stop for the handoff. They

15:56

didn't have to know or my location when nobody

15:58

needed to know that unless you're

16:01

a fucking thief and you're going to try to steal

16:03

it, which would

16:05

have been a tragedy on a

16:07

lot of different levels. You

16:10

can't allow anybody to steal from

16:12

you. Mike's business

16:15

it was going very well. His

16:18

nephew, Matt Vogel, a teenager

16:20

at the time, remembers how he loved

16:22

going to visit uncle Mike. I

16:24

bought a Francloyd Wright style

16:27

house in Milford twenty

16:29

five acres thirty acres, But it

16:32

wasn't just the classy architecture that intrigued

16:34

young Matt. One time, in one of

16:36

the back bedrooms, I remember opening the door. There was so

16:38

much money in there. It was just stacked in boxes

16:41

and twenties and hundreds, so you could smell it.

16:43

Money has a very distinct odor, and

16:46

there was just so much of it you could you could smell

16:48

it to

16:50

a complete an adrenaline rush.

16:52

Have you ever seen that much money and you know

16:54

it's just sitting there and you could literally

16:57

take it, and it'd be a long time before

16:59

somebody figured it out. Matt says

17:01

that hanging out with his uncle was always

17:03

an adventure. You never knew where he might

17:05

take you. So I get a call, We're

17:07

gonna go to the Super Bowl. We're thinking this was

17:09

great, so my mom dropped

17:12

me off at the Pontiac Airport. In fact,

17:14

they saw George Bush Senior, who

17:16

was vice president at the time, landed

17:18

Pontiac Airport and hop into his motor

17:21

cap, causing an epic traffic

17:23

jam. But Mike, he wasn't

17:25

gonna wait any traffic or deal with parking.

17:28

And I'm thinking, let's to deal. Well, we're

17:30

gonna take a helicopter. That's what you do. But

17:33

that was that lifestyle that they

17:35

didn't care. I mean, who flies

17:37

to the super Bowl because you don't want to deal with parking.

17:41

Once they were at the game, Uncle Mike he

17:43

seemed to love having little Matt around.

17:45

Go hey, Mike, We're like, oh, give me a drinking Okay, give

17:47

me a hundred dollars bell. I'd literally go up

17:49

to the bar at sixteen and a silver down.

17:51

There's always movie stars walking around. It's the super

17:54

Bowl. Buy him and drink hour or whatever it costs.

17:56

He never asked for the change. I must have went

17:58

home with two thousand dollars in my pocket. Of

18:00

course, two grand was nothing to Uncle

18:02

Mike. Nothing. Think

18:07

about it. How would why would you feel if

18:10

you could buy anything you wanted to. You

18:13

could go buy a leer, jed, or you could buy this or

18:15

buy that, buy an island if you want.

18:18

You know, it's a great feeling. There

18:20

are no rules for the wealthy, and

18:22

none. Just don't get stupid. This

18:26

is the guy the FBI and the

18:29

US Attorney General had conjectured about

18:31

a marijuana tycoon, a

18:34

man with closets that literally looked

18:36

like Scrooge McDuck's volt. But

18:39

here's the funny thing about Mike Vogel. Right for

18:41

him, the money came so fast

18:44

and easy that eventually, he says, he

18:47

kind of grew tired of it. Jake,

18:49

I'm gonna tell you something. It was stressful,

18:53

tough business to run

18:55

on my end because I basically was

18:58

involved the smuggling, in the

19:01

distribution of it, and then having to get

19:03

the money back out. I

19:05

mean, it took a lot from me. I was I

19:07

was sick of this fucking And

19:10

it wasn't just exhaustion. It was the

19:12

paranoia too. He wondered

19:14

who might be stealing from him, who would

19:17

rat on him, because it would just

19:19

take one one person for

19:21

everything to crumble. It

19:25

was right around this time that Mike got

19:27

a call from his partner, the guy who

19:29

actually smuggled the dope into the US.

19:32

He had very good news. The next

19:34

shipment, code named Bulldog, would

19:37

be ten times the usual amount,

19:40

three hundred thousand pounds

19:42

of marijuana. Mike Vogel. He

19:44

freaked out. I don't know, hell do you

19:46

bring out three hundre thousand pounds expect?

19:49

How to distribute it, how to get the money.

19:52

It was just too much. To compound

19:54

his fears, Mike got a tip

19:57

from a trusted friend, another

19:59

smuggler, a guy who knew

20:01

things, and this guy tells

20:03

him the Bulldog shipment has been

20:05

compromised. The FEDS know

20:08

about it. This suggested

20:10

there was a rat. I

20:14

became really distrustful of Shine,

20:16

Okay, really distrustful. Shine

20:20

and Mike Vogel had been working together for a

20:22

while. At this point, Shine betted

20:25

everyone with his light detector machine, so

20:28

if there was a rat, he had somehow

20:30

slipped patch Shine, unless,

20:32

of course, the rat was

20:35

Shine. You know, once you've

20:37

been in that business and you're always

20:39

worried about what's going on around you.

20:42

I'm not a dumb person, and he

20:44

just didn't fit. This

20:46

bout of paranoia occurred

20:48

around the same time as Bulldog, well

20:50

over a year before Shine actually

20:53

flips, So at the time, Shine

20:55

was not an informant and he

20:57

basically tells his boss, look, there's

20:59

no way our smuggling ring has been compromised.

21:02

Shine remembered this conversation and actually

21:05

recounted it at trial. I'm just going

21:07

to read you a bit from the court trans

21:09

Shine. I told him there

21:12

was no way in the world there

21:14

could have been any type of infiltration. I

21:17

had tested everybody. And

21:19

Michael said, you're either a cop or they

21:21

paid you off. And I said, well, I'm neither.

21:24

I told him they could test me. Prosecutor,

21:27

did he shine, Yes? Prosecutor

21:30

did anyone interpret that test? Shine?

21:33

Well, he interpreted. I had to chart

21:35

it for him, but it did take place. Prosecutor,

21:39

did you pass Shine, Yes,

21:41

I'm here. They told me. If I flunked,

21:44

I was dead. But

21:48

it didn't matter. Mike Vogo couldn't

21:50

shake off his suspicions, and so

21:53

he bailed on the operation. He

21:55

walked away from the three hundred thousand

21:57

pound load what was arguably

21:59

one of the largest loads of marijuana in

22:02

US history. In

22:04

the months to come, Mike Vogo continued

22:06

to nurse his suspicions about Shine. It

22:09

was like, once this idea had wormed

22:11

its way into his mind, he just

22:14

couldn't let it go. And

22:17

then one day towards the end of nineteen eighty

22:19

three, a member of Mike's outfit

22:21

blasts Shine with a shotgun at

22:23

close range, almost

22:26

kills him. This is how Shine

22:29

ends up in the hospital in a coma

22:31

with his son sitting by his side, and

22:33

this is why Shine walks with a limp for

22:36

the rest of his life. In

22:38

reporting this out, I've heard so many different versions

22:41

of why Shine shot. No

22:43

one can agree. Some claim was just a

22:45

stupid quarrel that got out of hand. For

22:47

his part, Mike Vogel denies that he had

22:50

anything to do with this, though he

22:52

did speak with the shooter and told him,

22:54

well, the problem with you is you're a bad fucking shot.

22:57

Oh she had killed the son of a bitch. You

23:00

can still hear a bit of rage in his voice

23:03

all these years later. It just kind

23:05

of flares up. And

23:07

Shine talks about my temper too.

23:10

Says that sometimes Mike seemed to become

23:13

unhinged, that he was acting irrationally.

23:16

He said that Mike was quote turning

23:19

into a Doctor Jekyll and mister

23:21

Hyde character. There's

23:24

still a little Jacqueline hide in him.

23:27

I caught a glimpse of this myself when

23:29

I visited Mike Vogel at his house. He

23:31

was for the most part, very cordial

23:34

and welcoming consummate Doctor Jekyl.

23:36

And then one afternoon showed up with

23:39

Matt Vogel, his nephew, and

23:42

I got kind of weird. Mike

23:44

seemed to think that me and Matt, his

23:46

own nephew, were conspiring against

23:48

him somehow when we first arrived.

23:52

Don't fuck with me seriously.

23:55

It's like, as I said, when you guys walked

23:57

in and you said

24:00

that you guys have gotten together, and I was thinking

24:02

about the other night. I said, you know what,

24:04

in the olden days, I would

24:06

have just called Ale

24:09

and another couple of bikers and

24:11

explain to you what happens if you keep on going

24:13

the way you're going. That's kind

24:16

of disturbing. Why

24:18

it would only be disturbing if

24:22

you were in the trunk of a car and

24:26

you're going to some other place

24:28

field and you get out and

24:30

they beat the fuck out of here and leave you there. Matt

24:36

and I just kind of looked at each

24:38

other. Was Uncle Mike

24:40

serious here? I mean, didn't

24:42

seem like he was joking. And

24:44

then just like that, Mike

24:47

was back to being Doctor Jekyll, friendly,

24:50

thoughtful, intelligent. Mike

24:57

may have been an intimidating figure. But

24:59

Shine, it turns out, had taken measures

25:02

to protect himself. He had

25:04

dirt on his boss, incriminating

25:06

evidence, rental car receides,

25:08

hotel records, and other evidence.

25:11

He even bugged a hotel room in Tampa

25:13

and surreptitiously made recordings

25:15

of Mike Vogel talking. Later

25:17

on at trial, Shine discussed this here

25:20

he is in the transcripts talking about all the

25:22

evidence he had. Shine, I

25:24

refer to them as my ace and the whole you

25:27

know, in case Vogel made any more threats on my

25:29

life, and I told him I had documentation

25:32

to back up my credibility. I could

25:34

corroborate certain times and dates

25:36

of smuggling. Prosecutor, you

25:38

threatened Vogel that you had documentation,

25:41

Shine, Yes. In

25:45

the end, Mike Vogel's paranoia

25:48

it may have been justified. Either

25:50

that or it became a self fulfilling

25:53

prophecy, like he was so worried

25:55

that Shine was an informant, so certain

25:57

that this was true, that he accused him

25:59

of being a rat, made him take his own

26:02

my detector test, even wished

26:04

him dead in front of others, And all

26:06

of this seemed to spook Shine so badly

26:09

it sent him right into the open

26:11

arms of the FBI. Coming

26:15

up. Ned discovers the Shine.

26:17

He has far more secrets to tell, secrets

26:19

that will lead them both on a bit of a wild goose

26:22

chase very far from Detroit.

26:37

Ned and the FBI. They didn't

26:39

go after Vogel right away. As

26:41

big as Vogel was, as impressive

26:43

as he was, he was just the distributor.

26:46

And if you really wanted to understand how

26:48

drugs were coming into the country and try

26:51

to shut it down, then he didn't just

26:53

go after the distributor. He wanted

26:55

the smugglers, the supply chain,

26:57

the financiers, the whole

27:00

magilla. The FBI

27:03

prides itself and working the entire

27:05

case, however long it takes

27:08

to get everybody, not just to grab

27:10

a kilo or a bail or you

27:12

know, seize a couple of cars or something. Their

27:15

game plan is to get the whole

27:17

organization. Plus,

27:19

if Ned arrest had Vogel, then that would

27:22

tip off the other players in the organization.

27:24

Ned he was still an undercover investigation

27:27

mode. He had just begun to tap

27:29

into what Shine knew. Remember, Shine

27:31

was the guy who used his lie detector machine

27:33

to vet everyone. I mean, basically

27:36

he was the one man HR department

27:38

of a national drug ring. But

27:41

getting Shine to divulge all that information,

27:43

well that was not so easy.

27:49

You'd ask him question and he'd be forthright on it.

27:51

But again you couldn't you know, you knew

27:53

you only had so long with him, and he would just like

27:57

overheat. Ned says he'd

28:00

do whatever he could to get inside of Shine's

28:02

head. For example, he'd take

28:04

him fishing so Sein would relax.

28:06

They'd have a few beers, and sometimes

28:09

Ned says he'd even try to speak with a Texas

28:11

drawl when they chatted, because Shine

28:13

apparently had a soft spot for Texans.

28:17

You know, I just say, I can't come

28:19

on, Shine, you know, let's

28:21

have another beer. I think my

28:23

bass was two inches bigger than yours, and

28:26

and he would he would get pissed. He's,

28:29

no, let me let measure that. Get

28:31

the get the measuring thing out.

28:33

You know, we gotta measure that fish. I think my

28:35

fish was bigger from the

28:37

outside. At least Ned and Shine

28:40

they seem like they were really tight. Ned's

28:42

partner at the office, Linnis, then a Lavicius.

28:45

He picked up on this he

28:47

and Ned were probably fairly

28:51

identical to each other, had the

28:53

same qualities and same gift

28:55

of gab. That's why probably Ned was able to

28:58

convince him to flip. The

29:00

difference between one and the other is ones

29:03

involved in the legal activity and the other ones involved

29:06

in law enforcement activity. But the

29:08

personalities almost

29:10

match identical. But

29:14

Ned says he was just acting

29:17

that it was all fake. In other words,

29:19

he was just doing his job and doing it

29:21

well, trying to get as close to

29:23

this guy as he could building. I

29:25

guess you'd call it intimacy, or

29:28

maybe it was more like emotional manipulation.

29:31

In any case, Ned says that the effort

29:33

of doing this day in and day out, it

29:36

started to wear on him.

29:38

I think it's almost a form of PTSD.

29:42

You're so psychologically involved

29:44

with these people, and I said, you know, you're solving

29:46

problems for their family, for their kids, for

29:49

their relatives or whatever. You know, they bring

29:51

every problem to you and

29:54

you have to solve it within

29:56

the rules of the FBI. These

29:59

two guys, they needed each

30:02

other. Ned needed Shine

30:04

to make his case, and Shine,

30:06

oh, you know, he needed Ned to help him

30:08

and his fa Emily find a way out and

30:10

escape in a way. It

30:13

was your classic symbiotic relationship,

30:16

but honestly, I think it was more than

30:18

this. Shine and Ned shared

30:20

something. There was a strange symmetry

30:23

to their lives. Ned was that dude

30:25

living near the country club who'd grown a Fu Manchu

30:27

mustache, learned to ride a Harley, and

30:30

was passing as a biker with access to

30:32

meth. Shine was a clever

30:34

criminal from the working class streets

30:36

of Melvyndale who was now laying

30:38

low in the suburbs, passing as just

30:41

another guy with a dad bod. They

30:43

were both essentially undercover

30:46

agents, but not identical. They

30:48

were mirror images of one another. And

30:54

then one day Shine

30:57

really starts to talk. We got

30:59

our hands on an FBI report. They cataloged

31:01

everything he told Ned. In one session they

31:03

had together, Shine

31:05

charts out the whole network, giving

31:08

Ned an organized chart of the whole company.

31:10

He tells them locations Sheridan

31:13

Hotels in Tampa, Florida, a house

31:15

and slide down Louisiana, places

31:17

in Ohio, Kentucky, Boston,

31:20

Detroit, and he confirms the size

31:23

of some of their loads twenty seven thousand

31:25

pounds, thirty five thousand pounds,

31:28

three hundred thousand pounds, and then

31:30

he had names for Ned. Allegedly,

31:33

those involved included an American

31:35

diplomat, a Texas billionaire,

31:38

a Teamster executive. The list

31:40

went on and on. Shine knew

31:42

everyone from the ship captains to

31:45

the guy working the radios to the offloaders.

31:48

Shine basically tells Ned, if

31:50

you can stop this organization, you're

31:52

going to stop most of the marijuana coming

31:55

into the United States. I

31:57

was excited. I know

31:59

it was a massive operation, and

32:02

I knew that we had

32:04

the key to the

32:06

safety deposit box to open it all up.

32:10

Shine also tells Ned in so many

32:12

words, I know how the smugglers

32:15

did it. I know what boats they

32:17

used. I know where the secret offload

32:19

sites were. I know how it all works

32:21

because I was there on the

32:23

ground when some of these ships came in. I

32:26

know the whole system. So

32:28

Ned and Shine they started

32:31

taking some trips together, and they

32:33

go deep into the swamps of North

32:35

Carolina to the marshy inlets

32:38

that pirates once used. Next

32:56

time a deep cover he

32:59

called me up just to

33:01

shoot the bull. He said,

33:04

Bob, place some

33:07

of us boards because unleds pop. I

33:10

says, oh yeah, he

33:13

was dressed for a disco

33:15

flat pants. He had a shirt that was silk

33:18

and it was open to his Sternham.

33:20

He had gold chains. All

33:22

these items you don't wear on an open boat

33:24

and Carter at County.

33:32

Deep Cover is produced by Jacob Smith

33:35

and edited by Karen Shakergie. Our

33:37

story editor is Jack hit. Original

33:40

music and our theme was composed by Luis

33:42

Gara and Flawn Williams is our engineer.

33:45

Fact checking by Amy Gaines. Mia

33:48

Lobell is Pushkin's executive

33:50

producer. Ned's novel is read

33:52

by Walton Goggins. Special

33:54

thanks to Julia Barton had their Fame,

33:57

Carly mcgliori, Leeta Mullatt,

34:00

Maya Caning, Eric Sandler,

34:02

Aggie Taylor, Kadija Holland,

34:04

Zoe Gwenn and Jacob Weisberg

34:06

at Pushkin Industries. Special

34:09

thanks also to Jeff Singer at Stowaway

34:11

Entertainment. I'm Jake

34:13

Calpern